Technical b r Report - International Military Testing Association

weapons system (for example) over night.
The typical training manager will fight the instructor billet battle
shemingly to the wire by a continual wailing over inadequate numbers of
instructors; yet kc is verv villing to accept neu curriculum administration
responsibilities for his overworked school staffs. Those xho question this
should ask themselves bov rzny or in what proportions were new instructor
billets provided Khen additional curriculum burdens such as human relations,
defensive driving, and remedial reading programs were directed for inclusion
into existing training programs. Yet, these good men seem obsessed tqith
management and its precise controls, and often decline well-intentioned
advice and assistance. That is putting it mildly, for it is onlv with reluctance
and suspicion that zany training managers will accept a rationale
or the experience of others who ore not only directly in but senior within
his line organizational structure.
It night be that the training manager has the utmost confidence in him-.
se1 f--not necessarily in his abilities to improve the training, but most
ascLredly in his zosie to be able to handle the many and varied resoonses
he x.-ill derive fro:! both judEnentall\- sound and highlv questionable decisions
which he has malit? in the nare of training manafzezent. After all, is this not
what trail,*ng man3zezent is all about?
,
Have I left iut planning--or the lack thereof--by the training manager?
I have not meant to. As any manager knows, planning is an essential part of
his daily routine. ?!y Lord, does he pian! He has training plans, personnel
pipeline plans, SER plans, CIKX?3 plans. . . Heaven knows how manv other
schemata he considers in the laying out of training requirerpents and in the
execution of training activities. But ask the training nanagenent community
for research plans and stand by for a high fog count in the responses. Better
pet, ask for definitions of training research and you’re likely to get respocses
In the order of “soneti,ine not needed”, “something received after the fact”, and
“sonething that is needed to verifv ;?v actions.” The training nanager, often
will inp to spend hours gruzbl ing, perhaps, but unquestionablv counting the nmber
of sessions in a score of curricula to develop data to satisfy an obsolete
report on a hands-or. vs thecry ratio, is generally not prone to review the
research conducted oc highly pertinent areas of his responsibility. Yet that
research which might well enable him to better conduct the business of training
may be in evidence all about him, gathering the patina of GSA dust.
Early in pre?aratlJn for this s:=nposium I decided that my assigned topic
“From the Viewpoint of a Training Qesearcher” p(ave me wide latitude in pinpointing
--at least to the satisfaction of my own perceptions--where the problem
exists in the translation of training researchnto training actions. I think
that I have now zade that ooint several times over and I supposed that, since I
probably have a goodly percentage of my listeners in a state of spirited agitation,
I should smile broadly and back ‘slowly out of t!le nearest exit. I promise that
I will do just that very soon, but first let me say that I tried to locate strong
support for my conte-tion from the literature.
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